Jack's employer gave him rather too much credit in supposing that the boy had already worked out the problem of finding those who had made the attack on the "Benson."
As the submarine boy left the breakfast room he felt as much in the dark as ever. The only known spies who were still at large, for some reason known only to the Secret Service men, were M. Lemaire, Mlle. Nadiboff and Kamanako.
"This is rather earlier than either of that pair in the habit of showing themselves," muttered Benson, as the first two names crossed his thoughts. "I wonder whether I could get the least bit of an inkling by going to the jail and talking with Gaston? If I could bluff him into telling me anything, it might be so much gained. I might catch him off his guard, if I could get him angry enough."
Full of this interesting idea, the submarine boy strolled slowly along to the little jail, forming his plans as he went.
Arrived at the jail, Captain Jack found the keeper, as yet, in ignorance of the dastardly attempt that had been made on the submarine boat the night before. He listened, aghast, as Benson told him the whole story.
"Now, I've got a notion that Gaston's crowd are very likely at the bottom of this whole deal," continued the submarine boy, in a low tone. "For one thing, while perhaps nothing much can be done to the other spies, this fellow, Gaston, is in here for a crime which, under the Florida laws, will go hard with him. It means that he'll be locked up for a few years. That may make both him and Lemaire ugly enough to put them up to almost any mischief. Was M. Lemaire here to see the fellow yesterday?"
"Lemaire has not been hero at all," replied the jailer.
"Was Mlle. Nadiboff here to see him yesterday?"
"No; she has been holding aloof. With the exception of his lawyer, the only people who ye been here to see Gaston were two fellows who came yesterday, about noon."
"Oho!" muttered Benson. "Who were they?"